Vatican a Rumor Mill Over Pope’s Health : Religion: John Paul’s slow recovery from a broken leg has sparked speculation that his days are numbered. And despite official denials, insiders describe a troubled pontiff.

What’s wrong with the Pope?

The health of Pope John Paul II has become a consuming behind-the-scenes question here. Despite official denials that the Pope is ill, an end-of-papacy gloom hangs over the Vatican. Rumors abound.

Looking frail, ever more stooped and limping heavily at 74, John Paul is a far cry from the vigorous pontiff who visited Denver and hiked in the Rockies a year ago. Vatican officials and American planners are discussing ways to curtail his appearances on a planned trip next month to the United Nations in New York and to nearby Northeastern cities, church sources say.

Senior church officials, diplomats and Vatican insiders paint a portrait of a Pope troubled by a slow-healing right leg and by difficulty in adjusting mentally to his diminished physical capacity.

“It can be hard psychologically for a man who has always been vigorous to adjust to the fact that he is handicapped,” said one senior churchman.

By one account, John Paul, who has enjoyed hiking, swimming and skiing all his life, is paying the price for having skimped on therapy sessions over the summer to exercise muscles in the leg he broke last spring.

Insiders talk of “great tensions” in the papal household, of impetuousness and atypical displays of papal temper. Last-minute cancellation of a visit to Sarajevo, the capital of Bosnia-Herzegovina, left the Pope bitterly and visibly upset, Vatican sources say.

Speculation that the problems with a leg broken at the hip in a bathroom fall April 28 are symptomatic of graver illness has been regularly and specifically rebutted, but it persists.

One senior Vatican official who returned from vacation last week says he was flabbergasted to be greeted by a rumor-passing colleague who assured him, “The Pope is dying, you know.” Another top administrator, when asked about the Pope’s health, vaulted over the question to a discussion of prospects for the conclave of cardinals that will elect his successor.

In fact, John Paul, who has bounced back from injury and illness before--including grave wounds from a 1981 assassination attempt--is stoutly resisting efforts by aides to moderate his schedule. Vatican sources say he is working normally.

Although he walked unsteadily and leaned on a cane, the Pope made every stop, whether of substance or ceremony, on a long-planned 24-hour visit to the southern Italian city of Lecce last weekend.

On Tuesday, 28 priests from Los Angeles attended a papal Mass at Castel Gandolfo south of Rome. “He moved slowly, but he had good color, was strong-voiced and in good form. Afterward, he walked over and talked animatedly with us,” said Los Angeles Cardinal Roger M. Mahony, who led the delegation. On Wednesday, John Paul mounted a stage, again with the aid of a cane, for his weekly general audience before cheering pilgrims at a conference hall here.

Officially, there is no cause for alarm.

“There is a mechanical problem of articulation with the prosthesis in his leg, but the operation was a success. We are still within the normal six-month period of recuperation, and total recovery is expected,” papal spokesman Joaquin Navarro told The Times on Wednesday.

In recent months, spokesmen have been forced to deny rumors that John Paul has Parkinson’s disease, that he has fainting spells, that he has bone cancer. The broken leg marked his second fall in five months: Last Nov. 11 he tripped at a private Vatican audience and fractured his right shoulder.